Amira Howeidy

PA is blunt­ly crit­i­cal of many Arab states, par­tic­u­lar­ly Egypt­ian ef­forts to bro­ker a deal be­tween Hamas and Fa­tah.

Pales­tin­ian ne­go­tia­tors are en­gaged in talks that they know have ced­ed al­most every Pales­tin­ian right.

Al­most a month af­ter their poor show­ing in leg­isla­tive elec­tions, Egypt­ian op­po­si­tion par­ties are em­broiled in coups, di­vi­sions and scathing self-crit­i­cism.

US tanks be­gin to roll into the Egypt­ian cap­i­tal, Cairo, and the city’s Sixth of Oc­to­ber bridge and the fa­mous Nile cor­niche prom­e­nade are de­stroyed.

When Egypt­ian Pres­i­dent Hos­ni Mubarak ad­dress­es par­lia­ment on 17 De­cem­ber, it will be the first time in Egypt’s his­to­ry that 20% of the MPs will be­long to the of­fi­cial­ly out­lawed Mus­lim Broth­er­hood.

A se­nior fig­ure in Egypt’s Mus­lim Broth­er­hood or­gan­i­sa­tion has ar­gued against non-Mus­lims hold­ing lead­er­ship po­si­tions in Egypt, in­clud­ing the pres­i­den­cy.

Egypt­ian in­tel­lec­tu­als and pub­lic fig­ures from across the po­lit­i­cal spec­trum have warned the gov­ern­ment against the reper­cus­sions of elec­tion fraud and vi­o­lence on democ­ra­cy in the coun­try.

A mas­sive ban­ner dis­played in a Cairo dis­trict pro­claims the phrase “Is­lam is the So­lu­tion” above a small im­age of the Quran set be­tween two criss­crossed me­dieval swords.

Egypt, the Arab world’s most pop­u­lous coun­try, has gone on high alert af­ter a warn­ing from the UN  that the dead­ly H5N1 bird flu strain could hit North Africa and the Mid­dle East.